first dslr

[chinesedonut]

any recommendations on a first dslr for a beginner?

 

[Gribber]

any recommendations on a first dslr for a beginner?

ask yourself do you really need a DSLR and whats your budget ?

 

[chinesedonut]

would like to have more manual control over my picture taking. and my budget is around $1000 up and down

 

[chinesedonut]

and talking about just the body

 

[Jeremy1]

Nikon or Canon if u want to go for DSLR.

Nikon - D5200/D3200
Canon - EOS700D/EOS100D

Those are within your budget.

 

[chinesedonut]

any advantages or disadvantages between choosing canon or nikon?

 

[Jeremy1]

any advantages or disadvantages between choosing canon or nikon?

More on the skill of the photographer.....................

U go down and tried to play with them....................

Moi choose this 2 brands as they are more common among people........................

U might want to try the Mirrorless camera.................

 

[chinesedonut]

any drawbacks if choosing a mirrorless camera?

 

[Jeremy1]

any drawbacks if choosing a mirrorless camera?

The focusing speed..................

It depend on what u wanted to shoot.

The good thing about mirrorless is it's portability.....................

Just go down and try it out yourself. For mirrorless, I would recommend Olympus or Sony.................

 

[chinesedonut]

i'll go down and take a look. thanks for the input.
think mirrorless might be a bit too expensive
and afraid that since it' so new, may not be as reliable?

 

[Jeremy1]

i'll go down and take a look. thanks for the input.
think mirrorless might be a bit too expensive
and afraid that since it' so new, may not be as reliable?

Correct, I would say. But the weight and size is really..............good.

Let your hand make the decision...................

 

[chinesedonut]

any recommendation on a first time lens then?
friends recommend getting a basic 50mm
or should i just go with the usual kit lens?

 

[Jeremy1]

any recommendation on a first time lens then?
friends recommend getting a basic 50mm
or should i just go with the usual kit lens?

On crop, 50 mm = 80 +/- mm which is a bit tight.

It's really depend on your shooting style.

Yeah, u can really start off with a zoom kit lens and play around first and decide what u really want later....................

By the way, there is a photography club here :
http://forums.hardwarezone.com.sg/eat-drink-man-woman-16/%3Dofficial%3D-edmw-photography-club-part-12-a-4210302.html

Can ask those elite there.....................

 

[sandywong]

1 important thing between dslr and mirrorless is the view finder, do you want a view finder or are you ok with using the lcd screen? If you are ok with using the lcd then mirrorless is a good choice since it is more compact and light. some mirrorless have a hotshoe which can add on an electrical view finder but usually external view finder is very expensive. Like mention before you can get some hands on to see what you prefer.

 

[SkimMilk]

for a start, 18-105/135 MM zoom lens will be very nice.
Start shooting from there, then decide if you need other lenses.

50mm is a cheap lens that produce great bokeh, but for shooting portraits / streets, not that good.
Portraits --> faces get distorted
Street --> VERY tight (on cropped cameras) if you are shooting in narrow walkways (eg: Chinatown streets during the festive season)

 

[davidktw]

for a start, 18-105/135 MM zoom lens will be very nice.
Start shooting from there, then decide if you need other lenses.

50mm is a cheap lens that produce great bokeh, but for shooting portraits / streets, not that good.
Portraits --> faces get distorted
Street --> VERY tight (on cropped cameras) if you are shooting in narrow walkways (eg: Chinatown streets during the festive season)

Agree 50mm at cropped is tight, but how is it not a portrait lens? And when you mentioned faces get distorted, are you referring to perspective distortion? The fact it is a portrait lens, means compared to wider angle lens, it introduce very little perspective distortion compared to how our human eyes perceive. All lens have perspective distortion since you are bending a curve plane onto a flat one, but 50mm is a portrait lens since long time ago on full frame. When used on cropped frames, it has the effective FOV of a 75mm. And professionals have been using 85mm on full frame for portrait, which is even tighter than 75mm.

 

[SkimMilk]

Example here. I missed the key word: Close-up portraits

 

[davidktw]

Example here. I missed the key word: Close-up portraits

Okay. That explains. So you are referring to the aesthetics nuances when coming to the ladies huh Indeed that's why there are also photographers working with 70-200mm standing really far away. It works too, if you have a lot of room space to walk around, or in the open.

 

[robolee]

any recommendations on a first dslr for a beginner?

Ask yourself Crop or Full Frame

Crop
35mm->50mm FOV on crop = Great at taking Upper body shot(Head & Shoulder can but u need to move in close to the model)
50mm->75mm FOV on crop = Great at taking Upper body shot/Head & Shoulder

Full Frame
50mm = Great at taking knee lvl to upper body shot
85mm = Head & Shoulder(Can upper body also but u need to move back)

Basically you see yourself comfortable moving close to model or not.
Or the model comfortable with you moving close or not.

example of my nub portrait shoot on a crop body

50mm->75mm FOV
by Robolee, on Flickr

35mm->50mm FOV

by Robolee, on Flickr